Day 1: 

Have you ever had a feeling like you were missing something? 

    I remember one time, when I was a kid, I lost my favorite stuffed animal. She was a little, white stuffed animal kitty named “Kitty”. (super original name from a toddler huh?) I had her from the time I was three til I was five, and she came EVERYWHERE with me. The store, church, the park, the car, and sometimes restaurants! During those years she was an important part of my life. Anyway, I went furniture shopping with my parents one day, and I climbed up on a bunk bed in the store. Kitty, of course, climbed up there with me. However, she forgot to climb back down. About five minutes after we left the store, I panicked. I realized I was missing something. Kitty! My parents drove us back to the store and we looked everywhere and talked to all the employees. No one had seen Kitty, and we couldn’t find her anywhere. I never found her to this day. It was a sad, sad day for me. Losing Kitty felt like I had lost something very important and vital to my life.

    The reason I tell you this is to illustrate what it feels like when you are missing something important to you. When I was a kid, Kitty felt like an important piece of my life that I needed to have with me. 

    I think, at one point in our life, we’ve all felt like we are lacking something. We’ve all had that question that says, “What’s missing? There’s gotta be more.” 

    That thing we have been missing, have been needing; it’s Jesus. Tomorrow we will dive into 3 steps of how to fill that missing place inside. 

Day 2:

Yesterday, we talked about what it looks like when you are missing something. It’s the feeling that something important is lost. Every single person has felt that feeling; like there’s a space inside that needs filling. The only thing that can fill that place is Jesus. 

Step 1 to filling what’s missing: Realizing that only Jesus can fill it, and understanding why only He can fill it. 

Like we talked about yesterday, everyone has that missing place inside that knows there must be more, a purpose to life. Often, we try to fill that place with things around us. We try to fit something into that place, and maybe it satisfies for a day or two, but then it falls away and leaves us emptier than before. I want you to know something. No family, friends, boyfriend or girlfriend, approval from people, good grades, good actions, money, success, substance, anything; will be able to fully satisfy that place inside you. That place is meant for One thing alone, the One that we were created to be in relationship with. It is meant for Jesus. Other things leave you feeling broken and lost, Jesus makes you whole and found. Where other things make you feel let down, in pain, numb, like there’s no hope; Jesus exceeds your greatest expectations, He heals you, He redeems you and gives you hope and joy. Jesus gives a meaning to life. When you fill that empty space with Jesus, He fully satisfies it and doesn’t fall away from it. 

Let’s compare it to glue. Things that we try to fill our hearts with to satisfy ourselves are like glue sticks. Jesus is like superglue. If you fix a broken mug with a glue stick, it might appear that it works. It holds for a little bit, satisfies the fix and makes you happy for a time. But it wears down, it loosens, and doesn’t hold. The thing you tried to fix is still broken. When the glue stick fails to hold and the pieces come apart, it might make the mug drop on the ground and break even more!

However, when you use superglue (Jesus in our analogy), it holds! It satisfies the need by fixing the broken mug. It holds, doesn’t loosen, and the pieces stay together. It is what you needed for the purpose of fixing the mug, and it stays the same; unlike the glue stick, it keeps the mug together.

Day 3:

Now that we know only Jesus can fill that missing place inside us, it’s time to prepare to invite Him into our heart to fill it. 

Step 2 to filling what’s missing: Repenting for filling that place with other things, and laying them down. 

Before you can fill something up, you have to clean it out. If you have orange juice in your mug in the morning, you are going to want to dump it out and clean it before you put coffee in it later. It’s the same with the missing place inside us. I, for one, have had many times where I have tried to fill that place with something else. When God points out in my heart that I have tried to fill it with something other than Him, I have a choice. I either brush it off and continue with that feeling of being empty and lacking a purpose, or I repent and lay that thing down; essentially “dumping and washing out” that place in my heart. 

In order for us to wash that missing place in our heart out of the things we tried to fill it with, we must repent and lay them down. This looks like simply telling God we are sorry. It means we tell Him we realize only He can satisfy us, and telling Him we are sorry for trying to fill it with anything else. As we repent, God forgives us. He then gives us an opportunity to surrender whatever that thing we tried to fill our heart was. As we lay it down, He begins to cleanse us and wash us.

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to cleanse us from all unrighteousness”. 1 John 1:9

As we do these first 2 steps; recognizing only Jesus can fill us and surrendering everything else, our hearts are prepared to be filled with “what’s missing”. 

Day 4:

So, we’ve acknowledged that only Jesus can satisfy what’s missing in our heart. We’ve repented for trying to fill it with other things, and we have laid those things down. Now it’s time to ask Jesus to come into our heart and fill the missing place. 

Step 3 to filling what’s missing: Inviting Jesus to come and fill that place, because He alone fully satisfies us and gives us purpose.

This part of filling what’s missing is exactly what it sounds like. It simply looks like asking God to come and fill our hearts. It doesn’t have to be a big prayer with all the perfect words. We simply tell God what we talked about the past couple of days: we realize that only He can satisfy, we repent for filling our heart with other things and surrender them, and we ask Him to come and fill our hearts. As we do this, He puts His Spirit in us. The missing place in our heart becomes filled completely, to the brim, finally filled with what was created to go there. We have found the thing that our heart truly desires and needs.

“I will give you a new heart, and I will put a new spirit in you. I will take out your stony, stubborn heart and give you a tender, responsive heart.” Ezekiel 36:26

This is what Jesus does in our heart as He fills it. He cleans us and makes us new, and satisfies that place that has been missing. We no longer have to wonder if there is anything more out there; we have found the thing that our heart was needing and missing. 

Day 5:

We have asked the question of “What’s missing?”. We have figured out only Jesus can satisfy the missing place, laid down other things we tried to fill our hearts with, and invited Jesus into that place that He’s meant to be in our hearts. We have gone through all the steps and the journey of how to satisfy the missing inside of us and get purpose and meaning. 

I want you to remember this: even when life gets hard, when you don’t “feel” full; it doesn’t change the fact that Jesus really does satisfy and hold our purpose. What you feel in a moment doesn’t change the fact that if you have repented and invited Jesus in - He is in your heart and filling that missing place. 

I work at a grocery store in the floral department. Part of my job there is filling up balloons with helium, which I really enjoy. However, there’s one thing I find interesting about the helium tanks. Helium is a gas, and it is actually lighter than air itself. So, if I pick up a completely full helium tank, all I feel is the weight of the tank itself. The tank doesn’t “feel” full. If it doesn’t feel full, you might expect that it’s empty. But it’s actually not! We get in helium tanks full to the brim of helium, and even if it doesn’t feel full; it is. When I press on the valve and fill a balloon, helium comes out, and I realize it is completely full! It’s the same way with the place in our hearts. We have filled what’s missing with Jesus, so we are completely full even if it doesn’t feel like it. When life feels rough, and it’s pushing on you like I push on the helium tank; you realize that you are filled with Jesus, and you are fully satisfied. So even if you don’t “feel” it, don’t get discouraged. 

I hope this devotional has encouraged you to find “What’s missing?” and fill it with Jesus, who is everything we need.